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By Maryna Besseling
Exam time is a stressful time for learners, teachers and parents. Unfortunately, it is not only the matric teachers who are affected by this – examinations are the time when all teachers of Grade R are evaluated in respect of each year’s building blocks that have been put in place.
At matric level it is, therefore, a measurement of 12 years of teaching and learning which is measured in one exam.
Parents often ask what they can do to prepare their children for exam times and there are some basic principles that one can put in place even a month before the exams start.
1. Create a restful atmosphere
Writing an exam is an unnatural experience for every child and they are afraid of the paper, they wonder if they have learned enough, if they have learned the right things and what their final results will be. It is therefore necessary that parents create a supportive and calm environment in which children can learn and prepare. It makes sense to have an area where sound and stimulation are limited. An area that is largely Wi-Fi free is very important. Devices such as cell phones and tablets distract your child. Research shows that it takes up to 15 minutes to focus on learning again after a screen visit, which significantly extends your child’s study time.
Include “bonus time” in study planning, where your child can interact with peers for 5 or 10 minutes between each study hour.
2. Practice, sleep and healthy food
Most children are not used to sitting still and studying for long periods at home. If you take into account that they also had to sit still for long periods during the day in an exam session, it becomes an even bigger challenge. It is therefore necessary that there is at least an hour of relaxation before starting the learning session at home.
It also makes sense for parents to make sure that children eat healthy food during this time to give theirbrain extra nutritional power for this great task. Studying is physically exhausting and therefore it is necessary to cut out especially sugar and unhealthy foods. Teenagers, particularly, snack during study times and it is necessary to have healthy and filling sweets available that can be consumed between study times. Some children are afraid that they may have to ‘leave the room’ and so do not take in enough liquid. Make sure your child is drinking enough water. Children spend more time indoors at this time and it is therefore necessary that your child still receives the necessary Vitamin D intake.
Routine is the best guideline at this time and includes set bedtimes. Children need more sleep during exams, precisely because their brains are hyper-stimulated. Healthline.com indicated in a study that children perform better in tests if they get enough sleep before a test. Improvement in results can be as much as 20%.
3. A meaningful study programme
Every child has his or her own unique style of learning and parents need to know which learning style suits their child best. Some children benefit from creating summaries. The summary does not only focus on the memorisation of abbreviated content, but also the choice of the content. The use of coloured pens and pictures, the method of reading and writing, also support the capture of content in the short-term memory. It therefore makes no sense to get summaries that someone else has made and then try to memorise them. This process of defining content for yourself in a digestible format takes time and can be prepared long before the exam. Trying to memorise large amounts of work the night before the exam only causes unnecessary pressure.
4. Previous exam papers
For many children it makes sense to work through previous papers to see how questions are asked and how the answers should be formulated. It is unlikely that teachers will set questions, and in the same order, in exactly the same format as in previous papers, so be careful not to do ‘exam coaching’. It puts immense pressure on the learner if the paper looks different from what they have practised. Try to use as many different papers, tests or assignments as possible to prepare your child.
5. Examination timetable
It is essential that each member of the family knows exactly what the exam timetable looks like, especially which subjects are written, as well as the time at which the question paper is written. Having prepared for the wrong exam and /or arriving late due to transport problems, puts children under enormous, unnecessary pressure. Parents can support children by making sure that the timetable is followed closely,and their child arrives well in time to write the exam.
Exams make up only one part of your child’s year mark and although we all want our children to do very well, it is just another part of your child’s development.
As parents, we can encourage our children to prepare well, but ultimately your child is the one who takes the exam and at the end, the well-being of your child is more important than the result.
Besseling is an advisor to the Suid-AfrikaanseOnderwysersunie
INSIDE EDUCATION